Odderer and Odderer
by Larilie
Summary: Who is this girl? Does Jack really know her... and how can she be here?
1. Chapter 1

Hi you lot! So… it's raining here and I've just watched Torchwood, and I'm off school, so this just wandered into my head. Don't ask me who this girl is… I have a vague idea, so I'll carry this on if you guys want. But this could stay as a one-shot unless things _really_ go pear-shaped. Janto, if anything, but… well, lets say romance is one of those things I can't write. Maybe later, I could give it a go if it comes into it. So here goes…

**Disclaimer**: Believe me when I say it's a good thing **I Do Not – Repeat DO NOT- Own Torchwood. It belongs to the BBC and Russell T Davis.** If I did, let's just say that it would be really, really bad. I'll just leave the Torchwood magic to RTD.

* * *

**Maybe**

Owen peeled his gloves off and sighed. The latest corpse was of a fifty-three year old man, one Barry Densey. The man had met a messy end in what Ianto was now going to call a car accident. In his defence, it had involved a car. Only… being roasted over your own engine by a bunch of - well, Jack called them Abrasoors, but Owen just thought of them as those giant spider-shaped liquid things. He was just filling out the relevant paperwork, when Ianto came to take the body down to the mortuary, somehow still pristine in a black suit, lilac shirt and silver tie.

"Jack says not to worry about doing an autopsy on those Abrasoors, the death certificates done, and you can go home if you want." Ianto reeled off, casting a gaze down at the unfortunate man on the slab.

"Poor sod." Owen followed his gaze. "Anyway, I'm off then." Flinging the half-done paperwork on his desk, he dived for the exit.

"Owen!" Jack yelled, stopping Owen in his tracks. Damn…

"What?" He yelled back, rolling his eyes, for the benefit of anyone watching.

"You need to see this." Jack began to bring up the CCTV of the cells on the nearest monitor. It showed, a girl in a cell next to a weevil. The last time he'd looked, she'd been chatting to it, behaviour Owen classed as weird, but not to be suspicious of. Now, she was crouched on the floor, coughing, struggling for air. She was shaking, and from what Owen could tell, attempting to breathe deeply, with little success. Owen swore.

"Where's her bag?" The girl had carried a purple bag over her shoulder when they'd brought her in. Owen had a sneaking suspicion he knew what was happening. Ianto grabbed the bag off the sofa and began to rifle through it. Finally, he pulled something blue and plastic from the pocket.

"She's asthmatic." Owen swore again, and, snatching the inhaler off Ianto, ran towards the cells. Ianto reached into the cupboard, pulling out a blanket, he snapped it open, and shook it out.

"What are you doing?" Jack looked bemused.

"If she's having an asthma attack, it's probably being brought on by the cold and damp down there, sir, not to mention if she feels stressed by being imprisoned in a secret base in the middle of Cardiff by a bunch of people who no one knows much about." He paused "What is she doing here?"

"I thought we talked about the sir?"

"Avoiding the question, _sir_?"

Jack glared. "How come you know so much about it?"

"Still avoiding the question, sir." Ianto relented "My sister has asthma. She was worse as a child, and I noticed what my mother used to do." Ianto grinned. "Your turn."

Jack grimaced, torn between asserting his authority as the boss and telling him the real reason.

Finally he said, "She didn't seem surprised to see the Abrasoors. She looked at me like she knew who I was, and I have a niggling feeling I've seen her somewhere before." Ianto looked beyond sceptical.

"So we've locked up a person- a child- on grounds of an expression, and a "Niggling feeling"?" Jack shifted uncomfortably.

"It sounds stupid when you put it like that…" Ianto didn't say anything more, but picked up Owens stethoscope, and turned towards the cells. Jack groaned. He could practically taste the instant decaff. Nice one Harkness.

Owen opened the cell, and took it as a bad sign when the girl didn't even look up. Supporting her back, he handed her the inhaler, and watched as she took first one puff, then another, with difficulty. Owen began talking, the way he did in these sorts of situations. Finally her breathing eased slightly. Ianto came in with a blanket, and Owens stethoscope, which Owen took from him gratefully, and, muttering something about cold, placed it on the girls back.

"Why didn't you tell us, you stupid..?" Owen listened intently. Then he gestured to Ianto "Help me get her to the med bay, yeah? You just keep breathing." The girl nodded, not yet having quite regained the power of speech, and coughed again.

Tosh was ignoring him, Jack was certain. Gwen had given him a lot of grief about the girl in the first place, no doubt when she got back tomorrow morning, he'd get another earful about her. And from Owen. Tosh and Ianto would just ignore him. Jack wasn't sure which was worse. There was something about he, and he had to know what it was. Something familiar…He ran after Ianto and Owen, who were dragging the girl into the med bay, and Owen strapped an oxygen mask to the girls face, and instructed her to breathe normally. Ianto left to get her a cup of tea.

Jack looked down on the scene. Owen checking the girls pulse, keeping up a flow of Owen-style comments throughout. When her breathing was almost normal, he began asking her questions.

"What's your name?" Something clicked.

"Ally Thomas." Owen looked up at him.

"Do you know each other?" Jack raised his eyebrows.

"We shouldn't. You shouldn't be here."

"Neither should you." Ally's voice was raspy, but loud enough to be heard. "Then again. I knew you'd be all over the place."

"But… what happened? How are you here?" Ally coughed again.

"I can't tell you."

"You were in-" he glanced at Owen, then carried on. "You were in the trenches, Ally. How can you be here now? You've got to tell me."

"I knew it'd click eventually." Ally sighed and leaned back. Within minutes she was asleep. Owen looked at Jack, then Ally, and decided to talk about something he knew about.

"She'll be tired for a bit. From what I've heard those attacks really take it out of you."

"What was that about the trenches? Could she have been taken by the Rift? Jack!" Tosh's voice brought Jack back to earth.

"Team meeting. Now." Jack headed towards the boardroom. Ianto left the mug of tea on a table, and went after him.

"Jack? Should I get Gwen?" Jack hesitated, and looked at his watch.

"No, it's late. I'll brief her tomorrow."

Owen put the CCTV of the med bay up on the screen, and took a seat. Jack stood, pacing the room, Ianto standing in a corner. Tosh took the chair beside Owen.

"I know her." Jack began, and shook his head. "I _knew_ her. In 1916, I was…fighting. I always figured… I couldn't die, so rather me than them right? And she was there. In the trenches. She shouldn't have been, women on the front line and all that, but somehow she managed it. She… kept our spirits up, talked to us, ferried letters back and forward, helped us through. She tried to treat me for a chest injury once. Only basic first aid, but it was better than what most of us had. She tried to help them understand shell-shock… good kid. The war ended, and she disappeared. I never found out about her family." He looked out of the window. "Then, second world war. I brushed it off at the time, but I was in London. The station was full of evacuees, crying mothers. I'm sure she was there, it was only a glimpse, but…" Jack shook his head disbelievingly.

"And now she's here." Owen finished.

"Yes." Jack smiled to himself.

"And… she was in the trenches? I haven't detected any unexplained rift spikes lately." Tosh began tapping away on her PDA.

"Leave it until tomorrow. It's past midnight, go home you lot."

"If she gets worse again, ring me." Owen instructed, before leaving. Tosh smiled vaguely in Jacks direction, and left as well. Ianto put an arm around Jack.

"Do you think she might know what's happening to you?" he asked softly.

"Maybe."


	2. Chapter 2

Hi again! Right, so second chapter. Wow. How am I supposed to know what to write in these things?

**Disclaimer**: If I owned Torchwood, Jack and Ianto would have realised they were made for each other earlier. Much earlier. But it doesn't. It belongs to Russell T Davis and the mighty BBC. Ah well. A girl can dream…

**Odderer and Odderer**

The next morning was uneventful. Jack got out of bed early, and without waking Ianto, which in itself was an art form. When he had got into the main part of the Hub, he remembered they had a visitor, aided by the barely audible mumblings from the med bay.

Ally was slumped halfway up the steps, very out of breath.

"For goodness sake," She was panting to herself. "Battle of the Somme, can deal with, but a few steps, oh _no-"_

"First sign of madness." Jack commented, peering down at her.

"I'm already mad, so that's alright." She twisted to face him. "So, how-"

"Don't you want to get out of there first?"

Ally shrugged. "I'll manage eventually." Her eyes raked his face. She groaned again. "I suppose you'll want some answers."

"Would be nice, yeah." He relented. "But I've waited all those years; another half an hour whilst you eat breakfast isn't going to change anything."

"Jack..?" A sleepy welsh voice issued from Jacks office. "Who're you..?" Ianto wandered out, wearing a towel. He turned a funny shade of raspberry, as he noticed the girl. Ally hastily averted her eyes.

"Morning." She said to the wall, as Ianto made a hasty retreat, presumably to find some clothes. "You finally found someone!"

"You bet. I suppose asking you…"

"Would be a waste of time, yeah."

"Come on, then." Jack pulled Ally up, and half helped half carried her to the sofa. Seeing her breathing become more laboured, he felt a wave of guilt crash over him. "Look, about yesterday…I'm sorry. I didn't think-"

Ally cut him off with a wave of her hand. "Doesn't matter. I'm fine now."

"I'll judge that, thanks." Owen had arrived, setting off all the appropriate alarms, but apparently unnoticed by them.

Ianto reappeared, after dressing at top speed, in his usual ensemble of suit and waistcoat.

"I'd better put the coffee on. Don't want you lot in caffeine withdrawal." Ianto was avoiding their eyes. Jack grinned.

…

"So you were in the First World War. The Second World War. How?" They were in the boardroom, Tosh had joined them as Ally, Jack and Ianto had been eating breakfast. Owen had been standing nearby, giving Ally grief for not telling them about her asthma, and Gwen had arrived during Owens examination. She was right, it turned out. She was, as far as possible, fine.

Ally fiddled with the cuffs of her t-shirt. "I don't really know how to explain it…"

"Try."

Ally looked at Jack for a moment and gave in.

"I…sort of… Pinged there."

"You 'sort of pinged' there." Jack sounded incredulous. "What does that mean?"

Ally shrugged. "One minute I'm there, the next I'm, PING! Anywhere." She looked slightly annoyed for a second "Usually in war zones for some reason."

"So you haven't been here consistently?" This came from Gwen, who'd been uncharacteristically quiet

"Nope."

"And do you know where you are now?"

Ally looked as if she was having a revelation. "Torchwood, isn't it?" She bit her lip. "Although…I don't actually know where Torchwood is any more…"

"Cardiff." Ianto supplied. "Roald Dahl Plass. Wales." He added when Ally still looked confused. "You know, Britain, Europe, planet earth, the universe?"

"Cool. Never been to Wales before." Ally tucked her knees up to her chest and hugged them. "I suppose Wales would be far too close to home." Gwen looked slightly concerned. Owen looked at her. Ally peered at her feet.

"So… where else have you been?" Owen asked curiously.

"Erm… World War One, World War Two," She nodded to Jack "The Crimean war, worked under Florence Nightingale, I did. Absolute slave-driver, that woman, but her methods worked, which was more than they did before… I dunno. Bit of Victorian England…" Ally shrugged, suddenly defensive. "Does it matter?"

Tosh cut in. "We'll try to establish a pattern, and from there correlate that with the rift, see if that has anything to do with it. Then we can try to go steps towards stopping it, always assuming that's what you want, and from there we can try to find you a place to stay permanently." She began to tap away in earnest. "If you could tell me the date you left here-"

Ally grinned. "Who said I was from here?"

There was silence

"Kidding." Ally added hastily. "Seriously."

Jack looked at her.

"So, the date?"

Ally thought hard. "November… maybe the 11th or 15th?" She took in Owen's sceptical look, Gwen's concern, Jack's intrigued gaze and Ianto's neutral appearance, before continuing. Tosh tapped away some more on her PDA. "It's a bit hazy. I wasn't in the best of moods."

"Have you ever visited the future?" Owen asked, curious.

"No, at least, not that I know of."

"Would you know?"

"Dunno." She shrugged "Possibly. I know when I'm home."

…

Three painstaking hours later, Jack recognised the signs that Ally was probably going to lose it of she didn't get out of there soon. One thing she'd always, always, _always_ hated was being questioned about things she didn't know much about. He assigned his team jobs to do, Tosh categorising some artefacts they'd found a week ago and never got around to sorting, Gwen and Owen, admin. Ianto had made himself scarce towards the end of the questioning; Jack was willing to bet anything that his archivist and lover had noticed the warning signs before he had. Ianto was perceptive like that. He took Ally out to look at the bay.

"So this is Cardiff."

"Yes it is." There was a companionable silence.

"You know Ianto?" Ally said after a while.

"Maybe. I believe he may be on our, as you have seen, extensive staff… some sort of coffee genius I think-"

Ally didn't smile. "I recognise him. Battle of Canary Warf. So much blood and death… creatures killing everyone and everything in their path." She met Jacks eyes, seriously. "Did he save Lisa?"

Jacks blood ran cold. "How do you know about her?"

"Well… I bumped into him. He was running into the danger, instead of away from it. He was saying 'Have to find Lisa'. I went with him in the end, but I never made it out of the building. Only to see her."

"She was a cyberwoman. She tried to destroy us."

"But she was still human. She was screaming. Cybermen don't scream. Do they?" Jack shrugged.

"She's dead now, either way."

"Poor Ianto. What that must have done to him…" Jack deliberated. If he told her he was fine, she'd never believe it. He settled for the full truth.

"He was ripped apart. He tried to commit suicide twice, but I stopped him. He hates me for that sometimes, I think." The words were difficult to say.

"Then its my fault."

"What, Ally? No. You couldn't have stopped it, you weren't even there."

"I told him to save her. I said she might still be alive. I told him there was a chance. It's my fault." She took a deep breath. "Did anyone… get hurt?"

"Ally, It wasn't-" she cut him off mid-protest.

"Who died, Jack?"

He gave in. he couldn't really lie to her. She could always tell. "A doctor… and a pizza delivery girl. Annie, I think her name was."

"And you."

"I never said that."

"But it's true." Jack looked out onto the bay.

"Yeah."


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer**: OK, I do not own Torchwood _right now_ –'cos BBC and RTD do - , but who knows what Father Christmas will leave under the tree…

Sorry it's so late, but I had mocks and coursework, and various other annoying-and-a-bit-important stuff to do. Right, so this chapter could go one of two ways. It could turn out _unbelievably_ angsty, or it could be sort of mildly interesting… heck only knows where this will take me…

Only a short one this time, sorry. I blame Parilitas, (My other story, Harry Potter) which has hijacked this story's space, and held the characters hostage until I agreed to write them another chapter. Aulthough seeing Jack try to fight his way out was funny. (Jack. Hogwarts. You get the picture. DADA with weevils. I kid you not.)

**Odderer and Odderer**

After they returned to the Hub, Ally disappeared. Jack wasn't particularly worried.

He'd known Ally for over ninety years, in effect.

He was sure she wouldn't delete anything important or kill anyone on purpose or somehow off herself with an alien artefact or bring about the end of the world- He got up to check on her.

After all, Ally was not the least accident prone person he'd ever met.

He was just recounting to himself the time she'd fallen over in the trenches and nearly shot someone. Not that she knew how to work a gun in the first place, when he rounded the corner to the archives and came upon a surprising sight.

Ianto was making coffee.

This in itself is not a surprising sight. Ianto makes coffee a minimum of four times a day (Once when the team arrive, once about eleven, after lunch – 3ish- and once at about five before the team go home - Weevil and end-of-the-world permitting. Not forgetting his and Jacks coffee in the morning. That was the closest they got to private time sometimes.)

No, the surprising bit was that _Ianto_ was showing _Ally _how to work _his_ coffee machine. _Jack_ couldn't use Ianto's coffee machine. The last time he'd tried, he'd been on decaff for a month. A whole month! And it wasn't February…

The team certainly couldn't use the coffee machine. In fact it was widely – or at least as widely as things got at an organisation with only five employees and a pterodactyl on staff could get - regarded as sentient with a will to harm anyone who touched it but Ianto. Owen swore it had tried to bite him once. Tosh was convinced that it wanted to kill her, after the time she tried to disassemble it for parts, and none of them could even prise it from the worktop, let alone dismantle it. The burns had eventually healed.

What was more, Ally was succeeding.

"Then I pull this lever here, right?" She was saying, as Ianto turned around and noticed Jack standing a little way from them, gaping gormlessly.

"Catching flies, Sir?" Ianto asked, amused.

Ally pulled the lever anyway, and when the coffee machine didn't spontaneously combust or explode, grinned. She turned to face Jack, looking slightly concerned.

"You ok?"

"Coffee… machine…" Jack gasped.

"D' you think he's in shock?"

Ianto shook his head. "I don't think so. Maybe we should get Owen up here to check. Or take pictures, whichever is more pressing."

Jack shut his mouth pointedly.

"Anyway, how come _she_ gets to use the coffee machine?"

"_She_ has adult supervision. And she's never tried to make coffee in it without grinding the beans properly first."

"_She_ is still here, you know." Ally replied, testily.

Jack pulled himself together. "Sorry, just came to check-"

"That I wasn't breaking your base?" Ally smiled ruefully. "I know you too well, Jack."

Jack turned on the Harkness Mega-Watt Grin. "Yes, you do. As it's a quiet day, I thought I'd let the team go soon, Ianto."

Ianto nodded. "I'll tell them, sir."

"And I can show you around Cardiff." He offered her an arm, "Care to accompany me upstairs?"

Ally took his arm. "How could I refuse?"


	4. Chapter 4

Firstly I'm so sorry it's late, but I had family over for Christmas, and the whole blimmin thing went pear-shaped. As in wrong. Not as in fruit. First proper cliffy in this chapter, or at least I tried...

**Disclaimer: I do not, have not or will ever, at any point, own Torchwood. And believe me, it's for the good of the universe it stays that way.**

* * *

**Chapter 4**

"Millennium centre." Jack pointed. "And the water tower."

"Wow." Ally pretended to listen as Jack talked about nothing. "Jack?"

"Ally?"

"The Second World War…"

Jack steeled himself for the inevitable questions. "What about it?"

"Erm… never mind."

"Come on, Ally. You don't find anything out with 'Never mind'."

"I was just going to say that well… I was there twice."

Jack stared at her "Twice?"

"Yeah. And I saw you both times… you were in the RAF, right?"

"I was, yes."

"What was that like?"

"Oh. Erm… it was a long time ago, and I was very different. A different man."

Jack considered. He _had _changed from the cocky young man he'd been in the London blitz, when he'd met the Doctor. And Rose. Poor Rose. "So… twice? What happened? How was that?"

Surprisingly, Ally dropped the subject.

"I dunno. It's hard to get any scale of time, as I am, but I was there from a couple of months before they announced the beginning, to about a month after the end both times. Once, the first time, I was evacuated pretty early in, I saw you go past. My friend, Josie and me, we were evacuated by her parents. They gave up trying to get me to tell them who my mum and dad were very soon, and when they realised I didn't have a home to go to they let me stay with them, in Josie's room. She was lovely, was Josie. The people who ended up with us weren't wonderful, but we didn't spend much time in anyway, even in winter. We had a lot of friends. We went to school, only came back for dinner and sometimes not even then. To be honest, the couple and us …we didn't like each other much."

"Right."

There was a silence.

*……..*

"But how do we know she's safe?"

Ianto rolled his eyes as he passed Gwen a cup of his coffee.

"For goodness sake, Gwen. She's a child. And although she looked quite dangerous when I said that to _her_, I don't think she'd ever actually hurt anyone. From what Jack says, she's actually something of a pacifist."

Gwen sighed noisily.

"Of course she'd say that, she could be… leading us into a false sense of security. What do we actually know about her? Nothing!"

"Gwen, relax." Tosh went to a monitor and slipped on her glasses. "Look, I've dragged all this stuff up on her. School reports, medical records, passport, family photos, news of her parents death – freak car accident from what I can deduce. Swimming badges, even a mention of her from a Torchwood representative early last year in Canary Warf. Before the… disaster."

Tosh's pause was almost imperceptible to everyone but Ianto.

"She could have hidden it." Gwen said, unconvincingly.

She peered over Tosh's shoulder. "Didn't you find a missing persons notice?"

Tosh hesitated.

"No. I'm still waiting for the more complex checks to come back, but-" She began tapping away in earnest.

"Shouldn't it have shown up on the basic search?" Owen asked, sipping at coffee.

"Yes. That's odd." Tosh began to enter commands at something rivalling the speed of light.

"Well, you said her parents died." Owen said. "Maybe there was no one to miss her."

"Schools should report if a pupil doesn't turn up. At least, for a period of time like the one we're looking at." Ianto put his tray down on the desk. "And anyway, she has an older brother, Mark. He's twenty-one, lives in Portsmouth."

"How do you know all that?" Asked Owen, perplexed. "Psychic are you?"

"She told me, when I was teaching her to make coffee. One of my best techniques for getting information out of people."

"_Coffee_ is one of your techniques for getting information out of people?" Gwen asked, cradling her own mug.

"Among other things." Ianto said, smiling suggestively.

"So what can we find out about this Mark?" Gwen asked, leaning forwards to get a better view of the screen.

"I'll have a look." As Tosh set the computer to search, things immediately began crawling out of the woodwork.

"Criminal record, married with two children, works as a used car dealer."

"Busy for twenty-one." Owen commented.

"Maybe she was pregnant before they got married?" Gwen suggested.

Tosh was trawling through the criminal record. Suddenly, she stopped short.

Her sudden intake of breath alerted the others to the fact that all was not well.

"You ok Tosh?" Gwen asked, lightly.

Tosh simply swung the monitor round to face the others.

"That is… in no way good." Ianto muttered after a second's pause.

"Jack should know about this."


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I do not will not or have ever owned Torchwood. However, one day... Today Torchwood, tomorrow the World! (And, yeah, you guessed it. I don't own that either...)**

I'M SO SORRY!!!

There's this thing called life, and it keeps accosting me when I want to write. Also Parilitas was taking up all my concentration.

Please forgive me? *Puppy dog eyes*

Ahem, yeah. Anyway...

**Chapter 5**

"So, don't you have somewhere to be?"

Ally turned to Jack.

"Erm… Apart from here with you, wondering what the heck is written on the millennium centre?"

Jack shrugged and didn't press the point any further. Ally knew what he was talking about.

*………*

"Jack's comms are off." It was Ianto who found out this little nugget of information.

"Great." Owen ran a hand through his hair. "So now what're we going to do?"

"Well, we could tell her we know, and let her tell Jack." Gwen suggested.

"She might run off."

"In the Hub?" Owen scoffed. "Don't be stupid, Tosh."

"Don't say I didn't warn you." Tosh turned back to her computer.

"Tosh has a point." Ianto pointed out, collecting an empty mug off Gwen's desk. "It's not the sort of information you just drop into a conversation, is it?"

*………*

"No, Jack!" Ally threw out her hands, nearly whacking a passing woman in the face.

"Come on, it'll be fun!"

Ally groaned.

"I remember the last time you said that…"

"Ok, that was a mistake, but this time I'm sure."

Ally sighed, nodded, and followed Jack into the museum.

Somewhere in between pointing out inaccuracies to each other, Jack realised that Ally was getting quieter and quieter.

He stopped them in a fairly safe exhibit – the Ancient Egyptians.

"What's wrong?"

Ally didn't answer, but sat down heavily on a replica sarcophagus, pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her face in them.

Jack joined Ally on the sarcophagus and put his arm around her.

He knew what she was sad about.

"Shh." He murmured, giving the museum security guard a look which should have had had him six feet under faster than blinking.

After a few minutes, Ally snuffled and sat up. As she began to wipe her eyes on her sleeves, however, Jack produced a handkerchief, and passed it to her gallantly.

"Who still uses handkerchiefs?" she asked, through the sniffing.

"Me."

"Ever hear of a box of tissues? I can guarantee whoever does your laundry would thank you for it."

Jack looked a bit offended

"How do you know I don't do my own washing?"

Ally snorted. "You couldn't use a washing machine if you tried!"

"Could so, and I'd look dashing and handsome doing it."

"Great skill. Look so dashing and handsome, someone else would do it for you…"

"Hey!"

*…….*

Tosh was peering worriedly into her coffee mug.

"No answers in there." Ianto commented, taking the mug from her.

"I'm just… What if..?" Gwen tailed off before she'd started.

"How do we know she's safe?" Owen demanded, snatching a cup of coffee off Ianto's tray.

"Well, Jack's fairly safe anyway, What with not being able to die and all that…" Ianto said, trying not to sound panicky. In actual fact he was trying to convince himself. "And he said he's known her for a long time – surely she would have done anything long before now…"

"Yeah, right."

"Owen you really aren't helping." Gwen nearly snapped at him.

An alarm sounded.

"They're back."

*……..*

"A secret door."

Ally sounded very underwhelmed.

"What's wrong with our secret door?"

"One word. Clichéd."

"Yeah, well. We like our secret door."

As they went through to the main Hub, jack noticed something was not right. It was quiet, but the others could not be out, because all the coats were where they were supposed to be.

He looked around, and realised something was up. If he knew his team – and Jack prided himself on knowing his team, especially after the "Lisa Incident" – they were up to something. Gwen had that slightly guilty look, and Tosh was typing away with slightly too much gusto, and as for Owen… _Owen was working_.

Ianto was the only one to give nothing away, but even that was mostly by his absence from the scene.

"Wow. Silence." Ally commented dryly.

"Jack," Ianto said, putting _that_ inflection on it. "Could I have a word?"

Jack made the token innuendo, and lead Ianto through to his office.

"So, what's this all about?" He asked, sitting down and taking his coat off. "Or are we using even more cryptic euphemisms nowadays…?"

Ianto ignored the comment.

"About Ally. You said you'd known her a long time."

"Well that depends how you count it. Either six months or about… ninety four years, depending on how you look at it."

"Has she ever spoken about her family to you? Or her home?"

"No, not as you mention it, but I never told her about mine either."

"We…looked."

Jack's expression turned frosty.

"Did you?"

"We think you may want to know – "

"Anything I need to know she'll tell me herself. They pushed you into this, didn't they?"

Ianto remained silent.

"I'll make some of your industrial-strength coffee then, Sir." Ianto said finally.

Jack didn't notice the lapse back into formality.

What he _did_ notice was that Ianto left the folder on the edge of his desk, tempting him.

He couldn't look inside it.

He shouldn't look inside it.

The folder was staring at him.

Where was Ianto with the coffee, or perhaps an even better distraction?

Damn him!

Jack picked up the folder, and weighed it in his hands. Open or bin, open or bin…

He opened the folder. What he saw made his heart skip a beat.

**Cyber cookies to everyone who wants to guess what the shocking thing is!**


	6. Chapter 6

Ok, so, another round of apologies anyone? Life wanted me to do stuff, and coursework, yadda yadda, you know it all by now… anyway, this is probably quicker than the rest…

**Disclaimer**: If I owned this, the world would literally fall out of space and time in shock. So it's probably best that I don't.

On with the show!

**Chapter 6**

Jack opened the folder.

It wasn't like anyone else had to know, was it?

His blood ran icy cold.

There was a photo of Ally. She was pale… unnaturally pale.

She was dead.

The date on the death certificate read 14th November 2006.

There were photographs of her injuries, a cut to her forehead, and bruises on her arms.

Around her throat.

He read the death certificate, and the doctor's report. Death by asphyxiation.

A picture of a headstone.

The inscription read "Alexandra Rose Porter. Born, 12th January 1992. Died 14th November 2006. Much loved, sadly missed."

Jack leaned back in his chair in shock. Ally. She couldn't be dead… it was impossible. If she was dead, it wouldn't have been… she'd never…

Unable to string together a coherent thought, he flicked through the rest of the folders contents. Photos of her in the company of various people he didn't recognise. Diary entries, rift correlations. He could see her down the centuries, as a servant to a Victorian family, a friend to an evacuee… the little kid he'd known in the trenches.

He had to admit he'd read the file now.

He couldn't just leave it at that. He picked up the evidence, and went to find her.

"Ally."

"Jack." Ally looked up from the sofa where she was playing with Tosh's Rubik's cube "I've never actually seen one of these before… what's wrong?"

Tosh became inexplicably intrigued in her game of Tetris, and Ianto grabbed a half-empty mug and headed for the kitchen.

Jack sat down heavily.

"We've never really talked about our past, have we?"

Ally looked at him as if worried for his sanity. "Not exactly. But it didn't matter at the time, did it?"

"Well." He said slowly, "My team were a little… concerned when I didn't explain about you, and they -"

"Did what?" Ally asked, her voice leaden with dread.

"They decided to do some research."

Ally stared at her knees.

"Ah."

"Do you want to… tell me anything?"

"For goodness sake, Jack! It's not like I've murdered anyone." There was a moment's silence. "You sound like my dad."

"Your dad?"

Ally took the folder from Jack, and, pointedly ignoring the pictures of her own autopsy, flicked through until she found the picture she wanted.

It was a family photograph. Ally passed it to Jack, and pointed.

"That's him. And that's my brother Luke. And my mum…" Her voice trailed off, sadly.

"Do you want to..?"

"Not particularly, but you'd probably find out anyway." Ally sighed. "They're lovely people, you know. I miss them a lot. You'd like them. They'd let you flirt with them, _and_ they wouldn't get offended."

Jack looked down at Ally. The feeble joke had fallen flat, and she knew it.

"All I've done today is cry." Ally mumbled. "I blame your base. For goodness sake, get some windows, let the daylight in! No wonder Owens so prickly…"

Jack snorted.

"What? It's true. They come here in the dark, they leave in the dark. They probably don't see daylight for weeks on end -"

"We get called out."

"Like plumbers, you mean?"

Ianto chuckled from by Tosh's computer.

"Torchwood has been likened to many things, Ally, but I don't think we've ever been called plumbers before."

"Well, you are kind of like plumbers. You have all your stuff in the back of the van, there's a van with your name on… you get called out, all you need is a leaky tap and you _are_ plumbers."

Owen snorted over the corpse of their latest weevil in a way Jack was positive you weren't supposed to in autopsies.

"It's not a van." Jack told her sternly, "It is an SUV."

"Fine," Ally said, mischievously "Glorified van then."

Jack realised that Ally had actually managed to drive the conversation away from her and onto something else. He'd forgotten how good she was at that.

"Back to the point."

Ally's shoulders sagged.

"Do we _have_ to?"

"Yes." Jacks voice was like iron.

Ally performed the nearest expression to a pout that Jack had seen on her face since Archie Braithwaite had told her that she had to go "Back to Blighty, as the front line is not a fitting place for a female of any breeding to be." Archie Braithwaite had thought rather highly of 'good breeding.'

"_Well?_" Jack pressed. "How come you're… dead?"

"How come you're not?" Ally demanded.

"He can't die." Ianto said simply, passing Gwen another bucket-sized cup of coffee.

"That is not true." Jack argued back. "I can die… I just don't stay that way for long."

"Explains a lot. You know, the men had bets running on how you came back from no mans land without dying so often. My personal favourite was the theory that you were sleeping with the head of the German… military thingy."

Jack thought for a second.

"Nah, not my type. Anyway, back to your death." Ally groaned. "There's no getting me off the case, kid, so it's easier for the both of us if you just start talking."

Ally folded her arms rebelliously.

Ianto sighed. This was clearly going to be a battle of wills, and Ally seemed to be just as, if not more, stubborn than Jack.

They were going to be here for a while.

*………*

Three hours and a lot of negotiation on Jacks part later they'd reached an agreement.

Jack had agreed to trade Ally the use of their shower plus shampoo (Because Ally told them that she'd last washed her hair in 1739, "And honestly, I will not be doing that again") a new pair of shoes, four books, a game of monopoly and three Crunchies, in return for being told about Ally's family and whatever she happened to remember about her death.

Ianto was just surprised that there actually was someone who was more stubborn than Jack.

Tosh smiled at Ianto. It wasn't as if it was every day they got to witness their boss being out-bargained by a kid.

Owen was listening to the argument, and Gwen had drifted away to find something to make notes on, her policewoman instincts screaming that she'd need them later on.

"Ok, in your own time." Gwen pulled her chair closer to the sofa and poised her pen to take notes.

Ally looked mildly bemused, as Gwen got into witness-interrogation mode. Her eyes flicked around the circle of curious people, and decided it didn't matter.

"Alright." She said haltingly "It was a dark and stormy night…"

*…………..*

"So she was murdered." Ianto said to Jack, as they shared a drink after everyone else had gone. Ally had disappeared into the bowels of the Torchwood Hub, where Ianto had found her something to do. Nobody was quite sure what, but she seemed happy.

"She was." Jack gazed into his glass. "Poor kid. I suspected, when I read the doctors report, I…"

"Wonder how this all happened though."

"No idea. We don't even know if she's going to hang around for long. She could be gone tonight or tomorrow… or never."

"I'll work something out. Long-term plans, schools and things."

Jack nodded distractedly. Ianto patted him on the back. "It'll be alright." He said, hugging Jack.

Jack hugged him back.

"It's not me I'm worried about. She… I don't…"

They fell into a silence.

"I'm sorry." Ianto muttered.

"She's the only one left." Jack mumbled into Ianto's shoulder. "There were thousands, tens of thousands of us, and now… Just her and me. All alone in forever."

Jack kissed Ianto. He hadn't truly realised that Ianto would get old, and even then it would be only if he was lucky. He'd die, and knowing Torchwood, that'd be sooner rather than later. He'd tried not to think about it.

And that scared him more than anything else in the world.

*………*

Ok, so that started out really heavy, was ok in the middle and then degenerated into fluff… wow. Fluff. Never written that before. Bit of Janto in there… tell me if it's utter drivel. So now you lot know the big secret! What'd you think? I wasn't sure, really… didn't know that was going to happen. Anyway, opinions, improvements, concrit, encouragement, heck, anything, send it!


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